- Video
Websites are not books
Repeat after me. Websites are not books. Nobody reads your homepage from beginning to end.
▶Play the video: Websites are not booksYour homepage needs to tell people exactly what you do, clearly and obviously. And here’s the thing people forget. Repeat after me. Websites are not books.
Nobody reads a website from beginning to end. People don’t really read websites at all. They scan them. They land, look at a few headings and maybe a couple of sentences, and in about 3 to 5 seconds they’ve decided whether they’re in the right place.
They’re not admiring your brand values. They’re not watching your animations. They don’t care whether customers are at the heart of everything you do. If they can’t work out what you actually do, they’ve already decided to sod off.
And most homepages open with waffle. “Helping businesses grow.” “Innovative solutions for modern brands.” My personal favourite, “empowering success through the use of strategy”. It all sounds impressive and means nothing.
Those headlines are written to sound clever in a meeting, not to help a customer decide what to do next. Here’s how to write one that works.
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Read the full transcript
So yes, let's get to the real problem. Your homepage needs to tell people exactly what you do clearly and obviously. And here's the thing people always forget when it comes to websites. Repeat after me altogether now. Websites are not books.
They're not they're not books. They're not books. You don't read a website like you read a book from beginning to end. In fact, people don't read websites at all. They actually just scan them.
They land on it. They look at a few headings and maybe a couple of the sentences and in about 3 to 5 seconds they've already decided am I in the right place and is this even for me. They're not admiring your brand values and they're not watching your animations. In fact, they don't give a single if customers are at the heart of everything that you do. If they can't actually work out what it is that you actually do, they've already decided whether they're going to stay or sod off.
It's as simple as that. And let's face it, most homepages start with absolute waffle, absolute bloody tripe. Stuff like helping businesses grow or innovative solutions for modern brands or empowering success through the use of strategy. My personal favorite. It all sounds impressive, but it means absolutely not.
These headlines are written to sound clever in a meeting, not to help a potential customer decide what they need to do next. Remember this one rule.